Reading - An introduction to this category

It’s been said that fire is the greatest discovery in history, and writing is the greatest invention of time. Writing enables people to capture their thoughts and share it with other people, who can read.

The identities our personality is made up of; in part evolve through meeting other people, who share the same identity as us. Learning from experiences of role models, conversing with others, helps us to adopt a certain desired behaviour, attitude, or insight; all of which shape how we exhibit an identity.

One of the challenge in this process is that limited in the number and quality of people in our immediate surrounding and local community. There might be influential people, who might help you understand specific topics better, contribute to your personal and professional development, and may even help shape one of your many identities.

Writing, then reading books, helps authors and readers to make connections, to have a form of conversation over large distances and at different times.

In all fairness, until the recent years, I’ve read very little. On the other hand, I’ve always enjoyed listening to people and having conversations with them. It didn’t matter if they are young or old, man or woman, gay or straight, muslim or christian, black or white. What mattered is that I learnt something from their personal experience. Since I realised I can reach many more people through reading their books, reading has become a lot more important in my life.

I’ve read memoirs of girls living with eating disorders, I’ve read stories of science-fiction authors, and I’ve read introductory texts from various subject experts on religion, cyber security, and geopolitics. I think of these books as conversations with the authors. I imagine we are sat in their living room, there is fire crackling in the background, and we both lean forward over the table, holding each others intent gaze, as well as a glass of drink in our hands.

Sure, you may argue this is not a conversation. The book has been written, and it is a one way communication medium, not a platform of engagement. However, often it is enough to listen in a deep and meaningful conversation, especially in one where the reader has little to add. Yet, if you pause after having read a thought provoking sentence, and ask a couple of questions, you will find that many authors will answer your questions in their book. This may be a couple of paragraphs later, a few chapters on, or in a new book. Sometimes you do not get an answer, but what you get is the question you asked and the opportunity to start a new conversation with other authors, writing about the same topic.

In this blog category, I will post about my inner conversations with authors - the things I’ve read, and the thoughts these lines provoked. You can also think of these posts as my book reviews and reading list recommendations.